Poll: Occupy Wall Street is Twice as Popular as The Tea Party

'Occupy Wall Street' members stage a protest march at JP Morgan Chase Bank tower in New York, on October 12, 2011. The “Occupy Wall Street” movement's momentum has reached many similar protests across the US and the world. AFP PHOTO/Emmanuel Dunand (Photo credit should read EMMANUEL DUNAND/AFP/Getty Images)

Photo by EMMANUEL DUNAND/AFP/Getty Images

Last week, I noted a Rasmussen Reports survey that gave Occupy Wall Street slightly higher favorable ratings than the Tea Party. Time magazine's new national poll is out, and there's no "slightly" here. The Occupy movement has a 54 percent favorable rating; the Tea Party's rating is 27 percent.

How is this happening? Over the past week, conservatives have treated Occupy much the same way that liberals treated the Tea Party, scouring the marches and rallies for evidence of kookery; the Drudge Report linked a video of an anti-Semite who'd joined the protests to rant about Jews. Fox News and CNN have mocked the protests (think of Jesse Waters saying they looked like "the sludge" that would come out of a blender packed with left-wing causes, or Erin Burnett mocking the Occupiers for not liking TARP), but not too many Americans actually watch those networks on a nightly basis. Most Republicans have actually couched their comments on the protests. This poll's internals give us a hint on why -- some of the Occupy demands, like prosecuting ill-behaving Wall Streeters or raising taxes on wealthy people, are more popular than any policy that's doable in Congress.